Monthly Archives: March 2016

Well, the opposite worked for President Reagan, will it work for President Trump? I. for one, believe it will. Oh, at first he will respond with something similar to what his predecessor did, but maybe without the four-letter verbiage. However, once he hears the “or else” he may be more inclined to take President Trump seriously. Here’s how it could happen, not that I would be so bold as to tell Mr. Trump how to do his job, but I am sure he has already thought of this plan.

An Open Letter to Mr. Trump

Shortly after inauguration, you meet with El presidente Peña Nieto and ask politely that he build a wall between us. He will, of course, laugh in your face as many of our fellow “residents” of America have done. At that point you walk out—the negotiations are over, which will probably be the shortest you’ve ever had.

Calmly go back to your office and sign the executive order that was previously prepared since you knew how the meeting with Peña Nieto would go. Immediately hold a press conference stating that on, let’s say 31 January 2017, any product manufactured, produced, assembled, or otherwise brought into the United States from Mexico will no longer be allowed entry into this country until an approved, impenetrable wall is built along our entire southern border.

As the one who wrote the book on making a deal, you know it sometimes helps to soften the blow of such a devastating action by offering up some crumbs. Therefore, you could add milestones that might prohibit executives at some American Fortune 500 corporations from jumping out their windows. Does anyone know how many of our American companies moved south for cheap labor, thus robbing jobs from American workers? So, to save lives, you could, for example, state that when 25% of the wall is completed, you will allow 25% of a company’s goods to cross the border, and so on with increments at 50%, 75%, 80%—go smaller here on to ensure work does not slow.

I can only imagine the screams resonating from boardrooms of such American iconic corporations as General Motors. In 2000, my bride and I went of a 43-day recreational vehicle caravan deep into Mexico. We entered through Mission, Texas and came out at Nogales, Arizona. Several miles south of Nogales (still in Mexico) we came upon the largest manufacturing plant I have ever seen. It had to be at least ¼ mile long. There was no signs revealing what kind of plant it was, but when we reached the other end of the plant, there was a huge parking lot filled with new GMC and Chevrolet pickup trucks. I have thought about that for the last sixteen years and wondered if it is still there pumping out trucks with American parts shipped into Mexico, assembled with cheap Mexican labor, and brought back into the U.S.

My guess is Peña Nieto will have lots of financial help from American corporations building that wall. Of course, you would then go about your promised actions of “encouraging” them to bring their factories back into this country so that “Made in America” means something—we all know how easily that could be accomplished—extremely high tariffs.

While you are having so much fun with unpatriotic corporate America why not add to the fray those companies who have transferred their customer service operations abroad? I call my telephone company, my cable company, my internet company, my credit card company, and even my mortgage company and cannot understand the customer service person with whom I am talking. I tire of having to continually ask them to repeat themselves—I have even experienced their anger because I cannot understand them. Can you believe the gall for them to get mad at me because I cannot understand them? Please include them in your quest to bring America back. Our language is English, and when dealing with an American company as a consumer, I should expect to converse with someone clearly speaking my language. I have no problem having to press 1 for Spanish, but I should never, ever have to press 1 for English!

Thank you for all that you are going to do when you take office. Give em’ hell Sir!

Semper Fi, Jim Bathurst USMC (Ret)

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My note: Who among my readers remember the early 70’s when contact teams from HQMC came to all major bases to conducted Human Relations (HumRel) training? We were told to develop seminars consisting of Marines of all ranks. I was a company commander in 2/7 at the time (for 27 months). The major from HQMC who conducted our briefing in the Camp San Mateo theater appeared in a rumbled uniform, shoes that had to have been shined with a Hershey bar, and sporting the largest Afro I’d seen to-date; he looked like a sea-bag with lips. My battalion commander Major John I. Hopkins (aka “Big John”) walked out in the middle of it . . . I followed. We got through that attempt at carnage, not by conducting their asinine seminars, but by applying something those at HQMC either forgot or never learned — leadership! However, this debacle is different. I fear for the young Marines of today for they have no senior leadership. Mr. Starmann, who is a Marine, states the obvious. My question is simple: where are the generals, I mean generals, not lackeys? We have none!

Friday, March 21, 2016

By Ray Starmann

The US Marines are the latest casualty in the Maoist Cultural Revolution being shoved down the throat of the military and incinerating the fighting spirit and readiness of the armed forces like a five alarm fire.

As reported this week by Military.Com, Marines across the Corps will be challenged on their unconscious prejudices and presuppositions as women get the opportunity to become grunts for the first time.

Unconscious prejudices and presuppositions defined as simple facts such as women lack the upper body strength, the aerobic lung capacity, testosterone for aggressiveness, are more prone to injuries, while possessing a myriad of hygiene issues in the field that men do not encounter.

The Marine Corps is rolling out mandatory training for all Marines before the first future female rifleman hits boot camp, aiming to set conditions for a smooth transition and head off cultural resistance.

Mobile training teams will be dispatched to installations across the Corps throughout May and June to offer a two-day seminar to majors and lieutenant colonels, Col. Anne Weinberg, deputy director of the Marine Corps Force Innovation Office, told reporters Thursday. Those officers will then train the Marines under them.

Mobile training teams defined as modern day Soviet Zampolits, or political officers, who will travel the world in order to brainwash Marines that this catastrophe is doable and un-negotiable.

Topics include unconscious bias, which focuses on how people prejudge others based on factors such as race and gender, and principles of institutional change. The seminar will also walk officers through the elements of the Corps’ plan for opening ground combat jobs to women and include vignettes featuring challenges units might encounter.

Challenges may vary and include losing wars, getting a lot of young Marines killed and being the laughing stock of our enemies worldwide.

“You’re in the field, you only have this certain amount of space for billeting and you’ve got three women and six guys. How are you going to billet?” Weinberg said, describing a potential vignette. “Just some of these common sense things that these units probably haven’t had to deal with so that ground combat units haven’t had to deal with, but we’ve been dealing with in the rest of the Marine Corps for generations.”

Newsflash to Colonel Weinberg from the USMC Innovation Office, aka Berkeley Pentagon Detachment: there are no billets in the field REMF! Your billet is a piece of ground.

The Marine Corps rolled out a “commander’s tool kit” of optional online classes on similar topics in late 2014 as the service prepared for the possibility of an integration mandate.

USMC Commander’s Tool Kit in 2016 includes: pregnancy simulators, breast pumps, tactical lactation station overlays, red high heels and the proper procedure to set up a unisex latrine.

A Center for Naval Analyses survey of 54,000 Marines recently obtained by The Washington Post gives context to the need for training on cultural and institutional resistance as female Marines go infantry. The report found that a significant majority of male Marines at every rank opposed the decision to have women serve in ground combat jobs. The resistance was strongest among male junior officers in the ranks of captain and below, who opposed women in ground combat jobs at a rate of more than 72 percent. At least a third of female Marines at every rank were also opposed to the idea.

The troops have spoken. They know an impending cluster when they see one.

“There’s no doubt we’re leading cultural change. It’s not the first time for the Marine Corps, but we like a challenge,” said Brig. Gen. James Glynn, director of the Marine Corps’ office of communication. “The purpose of the mobile training team is to begin to facilitate the cultural change … you’ve got to have the conversation.”

This isn’t going to be a challenge, General Glynn, it’s going to be a genuine, Grade A debacle that will lead to disaster, destruction and defeat on the field of battle.

What’s in it for you General Glynn? What’s it worth now to sell out the greatest fighting force on the earth to a bunch of Marxist social engineers?

It’s more than obvious that the Marine Corps brass and the Pentagon could care less what ordinary Marines think. The average Marine, like the average soldier, airman and sailor is being abandoned by their senior officers who have the backbone of jellyfish.

Women are being shoved into the combat branches of the Marines, even though most of them want nothing to do with the infantry, armor, artillery, the Marine Raiders and Marine Recon.

Women are being shoved into the combat branches of the Marines, even though women went 0 for 26 last year at the Marine Infantry Officers’ Basic Course.

Women are being shoved into the combat branches of the Marines, even though all female units and coed units performed far worse during various combat simulations conducted by the Corps during a several month long, 36 million dollar study that was completely ignored and tossed out the window by Secretary of the Navy and all-around lackey, Ray Mabus.

Nothing matters except the implementation of this insanity, the Marine Corps be damned.

The Pentagon perfumed princes and princesses are very clever. They have put the burden of brainwashing a whole generation of Marines on the shoulders of Majors and Lieutenant-Colonels, the middle managers of the Marines, who usually have families and responsibilities and the fear of being tossed out of the Corps and out into the big, bad world of unemployed ObamaLand.

The middle management of the Marine Corps is malleable, unlike junior officers, many of whom have no desire to make the Marines a career and who would gladly tell Ray Mabus where he can stick his gender neutral nightmare Marine Corps.

A majority of the civilian social engineers and the military minions have never served a day near any shot and shell. They have no clue what it takes to storm the ash laden hills of Iwo Jima, to hit the beach at Tarawa, to cringe under machine gun fire at Hue, to race to the gates of Kuwait City, to fight shoulder to shoulder in Fallujah. They have no clue what it’s like to be dirty and tired and terrified and to know that the only thing keeping you going is the knowledge that the Marines around you are the toughest, roughest sons of bitches on the planet.

Well, no more…

Requiescat in Pace United States Marine Corps…

As for Weinberg, Glynn, Mabus and the rest of the moral cowards and Quislings, you are going down in history as modern day Benedict Arnolds who will be responsible not only for the death of the US Marine Corps, but for the deaths of future Marines in battle.

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Hi Folks, Colonel “B” here, or for my troops of yesteryear “Sgt B” here. I have an announcement to make. If you are interested in buying my book, please do not go to the publisher; they charge way too much for all three versions (hard, soft, and eBook). I had no say in setting the retail price of the books, it was all their doing. It is a POD (Print On Demand), which means I paid to have it published, and they charged an arm and ½ a leg. You could go to Amazon, but they charge too much as well. Last I checked the hard cover was over $42.95, which is what the publisher charges, and then you might have to add postage. In the 5 years since publication, I have gotten back my initial investment. So, I sell only the hard cover because it is a beautiful book—not that I am biased at all—and it has some acknowledgements on the dust cover the soft cover does not. And, it will look good on your book shelf—smiles. I sell it personally inscribed for whomever it is going to for $30.00, and for Marines, I eat the postage, otherwise the postage is $3.61 So for $33.61 you are getting a good read, and cheaper than anywhere else, and it’s personally inscribed just for you. Please understand, I do not get the fantastic discount that Amazon and Barnes & Noble get, I mean I’m only the author. This is not a money-making endeavor for me at this point—I simply want folks to read it. So, if you are a Marine, want to learn about Marines, or know a Marine, here’s a chance to get a book that I absolutely guarantee will be enjoyed! Go to the link to the left “Contact Me,” fill the form out, put “autographed copy” as the subject, send it, and it comes to me. Once I receive it, I will contact you for the inscription information, and I will tell you how to pay for it. Thanks folks, and have a great Marine Corps day. Semper Fi, Jim

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We’ll All Die As Marines: One Marine’s Journey From Private to Colonel

We’ve got a whale of a book to recommend to all you gung-ho leathernecks. Colonel Jim Bathurst’s huge memoir is truly a treat to read and consider. In fact, I enjoyed reading every page of this fully packed professional, yet very personal narrative. Bathurst rose from a high school dropout and Marine boot to the exalted rank of gunnery sergeant before gaining his commission as an officer of Marines. His story will speak strongly to each and every Marine.

Marine General Peter Pace, the 16th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted in a dust-jacket comment, “Reading Jim’s book is like coming home!” And Gen Pace, I fully agree!
Initially, this wide-eyed boot set his cover on becoming a first-class Marine “gunny,” the early role models he admired most. Joining in 1958, he quickly adapted to the ways and ethos of his beloved Corps.

To young Bathurst, the Corps was not only a career, but a way of life. Starting off as a communicator, he continually sought assignment to the infantry field. His first overseas duty assignment was at Marine Barracks Yokosuka, Japan, where he spent his tour in a picture-perfect guard section. This formative experience would serve him well throughout his career. By 1962, the young corporal donned our Corps’ distinctive campaign hat and took to the field at Parris Island as a Marine drill instructor.

In early 1966, he arrived in Vietnam. Now an 0311 “grunt,” he joined Company E, 2d Battalion, First Marine Regiment south of Da Nang. Active patrolling, avoiding booby traps and ducking Viet Cong snipers were the names of the deadly game in “Indian Country.” For most of his combat tour, Sgt Bathurst, or “Sergeant B,” as the troops called him, in effect, served as their platoon leader. His stalwart actions in I Corps earned him a Silver Star, a Bronze Star with combat “V,” and the award he did not wish to win, the Purple Heart. There, his actions and instincts fully demonstrated he was a capable leader of Marines in combat.

Upon returning to “the world,” he was tapped to join the leathernecks at Marine Barracks Washington, D.C., the “oldest post of the Corps,” steeped in the Corps’ time-honored history and tradition.

It was there that Jim was promoted to his long-sought grade of gunnery sergeant. But soon, his previously hard-won field combat commission came through. The newly promoted Mustang was awarded his gold bar and commenced a new and exciting part of his storied career.

Wise beyond his years, he excelled in each of his new and challenging assignments. Over the years as he gained promotions, he became known as an expert problem solver.

As a major, he turned around the sagging reputation of the Marine Barracks located at Naval Air Station Lemoore, Calif. The turnaround was so successful that the base was written up in a “Post of the Corps” article in the August 1981 Leatherneck magazine. By the end of his three-year tour, the IG inspection of the base, now considered unnecessary, was canceled. Maj Bathurst proudly wrote: “They were actually going to skip us, something I had never heard of happening throughout my career.”

Before being promoted to lieutenant colonel, Bathurst was assigned to square away the drooping morale and production in Recruiting Station Chicago in the 9th Marine Corps District. Using long-tested leadership experience, RS Chicago was transformed into a star recruiting area and rated as the top RS in the district for 19 straight months.

Rewarded with top-level school at the Naval War College, LtCol Bathurst received his master’s degree in national defense and strategic studies. Then he achieved the dream of any hard-charging Marine officer—battalion command. LtCol Bathurst took command of 2d Bn, 6th Marines. The battalion was special with a reputation rooted in World War II, when it was known as “Huxley’s Harlots,” and highlighted in the Leon Uris novel, “Battle Cry,” and the movie, “Battle Cry.”

Promoted to colonel, Jim Bathurst was sent to Landing Force Training Command Atlantic in Norfolk, Va. There, he developed a riverine fast-attack assault boat capability for the Corps. As you might expect, this caused nervousness within the local East Coast SEAL command, and Bathurst pulls no punches in his descriptive dialog about the assignment.

Upon retirement in 1993, Col Jim Bathurst settled in Montana. During the winter months, he treks to warmer climes where he has ample opportunity to reflect on his time as a Marine.

In summarizing his life and career, Jim Bathurst says it best: “The Corps was not a job, a career, or even a profession; it was—and still is—a way of life.”

This grand tome is a sparkling tribute to the life and times of an “Always Faithful” Marine’s Marine. It’s jam-packed with significant lessons for leaders. The book keeps the leatherneck book lover focused on our Corps’ values, history and traditions.

When finished, I simply hated putting this electrically charged book down. Indeed, it was the best military memoir I’ve ever read. Thank you, sir. For a brief moment in time, I felt young again.